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A Full-dressed Ecclesiastic Is A Sort Of Go-cart Of Divinity; An Ethical Automaton. A Clerical Prig Is, In General, A Very Dangerous As Well As Contemptible Character. The Utmost That Those Who Thus Habitually Confound Their Opinions And Sentiments With The Outside Coverings Of Their Bodies Can Aspire To, Is A Negative And Neutral Character, Like Wax-work Figures, Where The Dress Is Done As Much To The Life As The Man, And Where Both Are Respectable Pieces Of Pasteboard, Or Harmless Compositions Of Fleecy Hosiery.

-William Hazlitt

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A Full-dressed Ecclesiastic Is

William Hazlitt

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A Full-dressed Ecclesiastic Is A Sort Of Go-cart Of Divinity; An Ethical Automaton. A Clerical Prig Is, In General, A Very Dangerous As Well As Contemptible Character. The Utmost That Those Who Thus Habitually Confound Their Opinions And Sentiments With The Outside Coverings Of Their Bodies Can Aspire To, Is A Negative And Neutral Character, Like Wax-work Figures, Where The Dress Is Done As Much To The Life As The Man, And Where Both Are Respectable Pieces Of Pasteboard, Or Harmless Compositions Of Fleecy Hosiery.

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We Prefer Ourselves To Others, Only Because We A Have More Intimate Consciousness And Confirmed Opinion Of Our Own Claims And Merits Than Of Any Other Person's.

A Really Great Man Has Always An Idea Of Something Greater Than Himself.

By Conversing With The Mighty Dead, We Imbibe Sentiment With Knowledge. We Become Strongly Attached To Those Who Can No Longer Either Hurt Or Serve Us, Except Through The Influence Which They Exert Over The Mind. We Feel The Presence Of That Power Which Gives Immortality To Human Thoughts And Actions, And Catch The Flame Of Enthusiasm From All Nations And Ages.

Men Of The Greatest Genius Are Not Always The Most Prodigal Of Their Encomiums. But Then It Is When Their Range Of Power Is Confined, And They Have In Fact Little Perception, Except Of Their Own Particular Kind Of Excellence.

He Who Expects From A Great Name In Politics, In Philosophy, In Art, Equal Greatness In Other Things, Is Little Versed In Human Nature. Our Strength Lies In Our Weakness. The Learned In Books Are Ignorant Of The World. He Who Is Ignorant Of Books Is Often Well Acquainted With Other Things; For Life Is Of The Same Length In The Learned And Unlearned; The Mind Cannot Be Idle; If It Is Not Taken Up With One Thing, It Attends To Another Through Choice Or Necessity; And The Degree Of Previous Capacity In One Class Or Another Is A Mere Lottery.

The Great Have Private Feelings Of Their Own, To Which The Interests Of Humanity And Justice Must Curtsy. Their Interests Are So Far From Being The Same As Those Of The Community, That They Are In Direct And Necessary Opposition To Them; Their Power Is At The Expense Of Our Weakness; Their Riches Of Our Poverty; Their Pride Of Our Degradation; Their Splendour Of Our Wretchedness; Their Tyranny Of Our Servitude.

The Best Kind Of Conversation Is That Which May Be Called Thinking Aloud.

Lying Is The Strongest Acknowledgement Of The Force Of Truth.

Acknowledgement

The Dupe Of Friendship, And The Fool Of Love; Have I Not Reason To Hate And To Despise Myself? Indeed I Do; And Chiefly For Not Having Hated And Despised The World Enough.

Lost Friendship

Features Alone Do Not Run In The Blood; Vices And Virtues, Genius And Folly, Are Transmitted Through The Same Sure But Unseen Channel.

The Youth Is Better Than The Old Age Of Friendship.

The Difference Between The Vanity Of A Frenchman And An Englishman Seems To Be This: The One Thinks Everything Right That Is French, The Other Thinks Everything Wrong That Is Not English.

Anyone Must Be Mainly Ignorant Or Thoughtless, Who Is Surprised At Everything He Sees; Or Wonderfully Conceited Who Expects Everything To Conform To His Standard Of Propriety.

Comedy Naturally Wears Itself Out - Destroys The Very Food On Which It Lives; And By Constantly And Successfully Exposing The Follies And Weaknesses Of Mankind To Ridicule, In The End Leaves Itself Nothing Worth Laughing At.

The Book-worm Wraps Himself Up In His Web Of Verbal Generalities, And Sees Only The Glimmering Shadows Of Things Reflected From The Minds Of Others.

People Are Not Soured By Misfortune, But By The Reception They Meet With In It.

While We Desire, We Do Not Enjoy; And With Enjoyment Desire Ceases.

It Is Better To Drink Of Deep Grief Than To Taste Shallow Pleasures.

A Great Man La An Abstraction Of Some One Excellence; But Whoever Fancies Himself An Abstraction Of Excellence, So Far From Being Great, May Be Sure That He Is A Blockhead, Equally Ignorant Of Excellence Or Defect Of Himself Or Others.

If You Think You Can Win, You Can Win. Faith Is Necessary To Victory.

Keep Your Misfortunes To Yourself.

The Art Of Conversation Is The Art Of Hearing As Well As Of Being Heard.

Repose Is As Necessary In Conversation As In A Picture.

The Love Of Fame Is Too High And Delicate A Feeling In The Mind To Be Mixed Up With Realities, It Is A Solitary Abstraction. * * * A Name "fast Anchored In The Deep Abyss Of Time" Is Like A Star Twinkling In The Firmament, Cold, Silent, Distant, But Eternal And Sublime; And Our Transmitting One To Posterity Is As If We Should Contemplate Our Translation To The Skies.

To Speak Highly Of One With Whom We Are Intimate Is A Species Of Egotism. Our Modesty As Well As Our Jealousy Teaches Us Caution On This Subject.

The Greatest Pleasure In Life Is That Of Reading While We Are Young. I Have Had As Much Of This Pleasure Perhaps As Any One.

It Is Not Fit That Every Man Should Travel; It Makes A Wise Man Better, And A Fool Worse.

Those Who Speak Ill Of The Spiritual Life, Although They Come And Go By Day, Are Like The Smith's Bellows: They Take Breath But Are Not Alive.

The Incentive To Ambition Is The Love Of Power.

It Is Not The Passion Of A Mind Struggling With Misfortune, Or The Hopelessness Of Its Desires, But Of A Mind Preying On Itself, And Disgusted With, Or Indifferent To All Other Things.

We Trifle With, Make Sport Of, And Despise Those Who Are Attached To Us, And Follow Those That Fly From Us.

If Mankind Had Wished For What Is Right, They Might Have Had It Long Ago.

Genius Only Leaves Behind It The Monuments Of Its Strength.

There Is No Prejudice So Strong As That Which Arises From A Fancied Exemption From All Prejudice.

A Nickname Is The Hardest Stone That The Devil Can Throw At A Man.

Zeal Will Do More Than Knowledge.

Hope Is The Best Possession.

No Man Would, I Think, Exchange His Existence With Any Other Man, However Fortunate. We Had As Lief Not Be, As Not Be Ourselves.

Prejudice Is The Child Of Ignorance.

The Severest Critics Are Always Those Who Have Either Never Attempted, Or Who Have Failed In Original Composition.

Grace Has Been Defined As The Outward Expression Of The Inward Harmony Of The Soul.

A Certain Excess Of Animal Spirits With Thoughtless Good-humor Will Often Make More Enemies Than The Most Deliberate Spite And Ill-nature, Which Is On Its Guard, And Strikes With Caution And Safety.

Literature, Like Nobility, Runs In The Blood.

He Is A Hypocrite Who Professes What He Does Not Believe; Not He Who Does Not Practice All He Wishes Or Approves.

Those People Who Are Always Improving Never Become Great. Greatness Is An Eminence, The Ascent To Which Is Steep And Lofty, And Which A Man Must Seize On At Once By Natural Boldness And Vigor, And Not By Patient, Wary Steps.

Religion Either Makes Men Wise And Virtuous, Or It Makes Them Set Up False Pretenses To Both.

The Definition Of Genius Is That It Acts Unconsciously, And Those Who Have Produced Immortal Works Have Done So Without Knowing How Or Why.

The Most Violent Friendships Soonest Wear Themselves Out.

There Is Something Captivating In Spirit And Intrepidity, To Which, We Often Yield As To A Resistless Power; Nor Can He Reasonably Expect, The Confidence Of Others Who Too Apparently Distrusts Himself.

Women Never Reason, And Therefore They Are (comparatively) Seldom Wrong.

We Talk Little When We Do Not Talk About Ourselves.

We Would Willingly, And Without Remorse, Sacrifice Not Only The Present Moment, But All The Interval (no Matter How Long) That Separates Us From Any Favorite Object.

The Imagination Is Of So Delicate A Texture That Even Words Wound It.

Life Is A Continued Struggle To Be What We Are Not, And To Do What We Cannot.

We Are Never So Much Disposed To Quarrel With Others As When We Are Dissatisfied With Ourselves.

Positive Thinking

Wherever The Government Does Not Emanate...from The People, The Principle Of The Government, The Esprit De Corps, The Point Of Honour, In All Those Connected With It, And Raised By It To Privileges Above The Law And Above Humanity, Will Be Hatred To The People.

It Is Better To Be Able Neither To Read Nor Write Than To Be Able To Do Nothing Else.

Books Wind Into The Heart.

Corporate Bodies Are More Corrupt And Profligate Than Individuals, Because They Have More Power To Do Mischief, And Are Less Amenable To Disgrace Or Punishment. They Feel Neither Shame, Remorse, Gratitude, Nor Goodwill.

The Love Of Letters Is The Forlorn Hope Of The Man Of Letters. His Ruling Passion Is The Love Of Fame.

The Soul Of Dispatch Is Decision.

Learning Is The Knowledge Of That Which None But The Learned Know.

I Am Always Afraid Of A Fool. One Cannot Be Sure That He Is Not A Knave As Well.

The Wretched Are In This Respect Fortunate, That They Have The Strongest Yearning After Happiness; And To Desire Is In Some Sense To Enjoy.

To Be Wiser Than Other Men Is To Be Honester Than They; And Strength Of Mind Is Only Courage To See And Speak The Truth.

Art Is The Microscope Of The Mind, Which Sharpens The Wit As The Other Does The Sight; And Converts Every Object Into A Little Universe In Itself. Art May Be Said To Draw Aside The Veil From Nature. To Those Who Are Perfectly Unskilled In The Practice, Unimbued With The Principles Of Art, Most Objects Present Only A Confused Mass.

Look Up, Laugh Loud, Talk Big, Keep The Color In Your Cheek And The Fire In Your Eye, Adorn Your Person, Maintain Your Health, Your Beauty And Your Animal Spirits.

In Public Speaking, We Must Appeal Either To The Prejudices Of Others, Or To The Love Of Truth And Justice. If We Think Merely Of Displaying Our Own Ability, We Shall Ruin Every Cause We Undertake.

Charity, Like Nature, Abhors A Vacuum. Next To Putting It In A Bank, Men Like To Squander Their Superfluous Wealth On Those To Whom It Is Sure To Be Doing The Least Possible Good.

There Is Evil Poured Upon The Earth From The Overflowings Of Corruption-- Sickness, And Poverty, And Pain, And Guilt, And Madness, And Sorrow; But, As The Water From A Fountain Riseth And Sinketh To Its Level, Ceaselessly Toileth Justice To Equalize The Lots Of Men.

The Only Impeccable Writers Are Those Who Never Wrote.

As We Advance In Life, We Acquire A Keener Sense Of The Value Of Time. Nothing Else, Indeed, Seems Of Any Consequence; And We Become Misers In This Respect.

Those Who Have Little Shall Have Less, And That Those Who Have Much Shall Take All That Others Have Left.

Violent Antipathies Are Always Suspicious, And Betray A Secret Affinity.

There Cannot Be A Surer Proof Of Low Origin, Or Of An Innate Meanness Of Disposition, Than To Be Always Talking And Thinking Of Being Genteel.

Persons Who Undertake To Pry Into, Or Cleanse Out All The Filth Of A Common Sewer, Either Cannot Have Very Nice Noses, Or Will Soon Lose Them.

Cunning Is The Art Of Concealing Our Own Defects, And Discovering Other People's Weaknesses.

The Poetical Impression Of Any Object Is That Uneasy, Exquisite Sense Of Beauty Or Power That Cannot Be Contained Within Itself; That Is Impatient Of All Limit; That (as Flame Bends To Flame) Strives To Link Itself To Some Other Image Of Kindred Beauty Or Grandeur; To Enshrine Itself, As It Were, In The Highest Forms Of Fancy, And To Relieve The Aching Sense Of Pleasure By Expressing It In The Boldest Manner.

Dandyism Is A Variety Of Genius.

Most Of The Methods For Measuring The Lapse Of Time Have, I Believe, Been The Contrivance Of Monks And Religious Recluses, Who, Finding Time Hang Heavy On Their Hands, Were At Some Pains To See How They Got Rid Of It.

Grace In Women Has More Effect Than Beauty.

However We May Flatter Ourselves To The Contrary, Our Friends Think No Higher Of Us Than The World Do. They See Us Through The Jaundiced Or Distrustful Eyes Of Others. They May Know Better, But Their Feelings Are Governed By Popular Prejudice. Nay, They Are More Shy Of Us (when Under A Cloud) Than Even Strangers; For We Involve Them In A Common Disgrace, Or Compel Them To Embroil Themselves In Continual Quarrels And Disputes In Our Defense.

Just As Much As We See In Others We Have In Ourselves.

Self Confidence

I Hate Anything That Occupies More Space Than It Is Worth... I Hate To See A Parcel Of Big Words Without Anything In Them.

Our Energy Is In Proportion To The Resistance It Meets. We Attempt Nothing Great But From A Sense Of The Difficulties We Have To Encounter, We Persevere In Nothing Great But From A Pride In Overcoming Them.

In Some Situations, If You Say Nothing, You Are Called Dull; If You Talk, You Are Thought Impertinent And Arrogant. It Is Hard To Know What To Do In This Case. The Question Seems To Be, Whether Your Vanity Or Your Prudence Predominates.

Whatever Is Placed Beyond The Reach Of Sense And Knowledge, Whatever Is Imperfectly Discerned, The Fancy Pieces Out At Its Leisure; And All But The Present Moment, But The Present Spot, Passion Claims For Its Own, And Brooding Over It With Wings Outspread, Stamps It With An Image Of Itself. Passion Is Lord Of Infinite Space, And Distant Objects Please Because They Border On Its Confines And Are Moulded By Its Touch.

The Diffusion Of Taste Is Not The Same Thing As The Improvement Of Taste.

Power Is Pleasure; And Pleasure Sweetens Pain.

Those Who Are Pleased With The Fewest Things Know The Least, As Those Who Are Pleased With Everything Know Nothing.

True Modesty And True Pride Are Much The Same Thing: Both Consist In Setting A Just Value On Ourselves - Neither More Nor Less.

We All Wear Some Disguise, Make Some Professions, Use Some Artifice, To Set Ourselves Off As Being Better Than We Are; And Yet It Is Not Denied That We Have Some Good Intentions And Praiseworthy Qualities At Bottom.

Good Intentions

Man Is A Poetical Animal, And Delights In Fiction.

Avarice Is The Miser's Dream, As Fame Is The Poet's.

If The World Were Good For Nothing Else, It Is A Fine Subject For Speculation.

One Of The Pleasantest Things In The World Is Going On A Journey; I Can Enjoy Society In A Room; But Out Of Doors, Nature Is Company Enough For Me. I Am Then Never Less Alone Than When Alone.

Those Who Are At War With Others Are Not At Peace With Themselves.

Few Things Tend More To Alienate Friendship Than A Want Of Punctuality In Our Engagements. I Have Known The Breach Of A Promise To Dine Or Sup To Break Up More Than One Intimacy.

When I Take Up A Book I Have Read Before, I Know What To Expect; The Satisfaction Is Not Lessened By Being Anticipated. I Shake Hands With, And Look Our Old Tried And Valued Friend In The Face,--compare Notes And Chat The Hour Away.

People Do Not Seem To Talk For The Sake Of Expressing Their Opinions, But To Maintain An Opinion For The Sake Of Talking.

Mankind Are An Incorrigible Race. Give Them But Bugbears And Idols -- It Is All That They Ask; The Distinctions Of Right And Wrong, Of Truth And Falsehood, Of Good And Evil, Are Worse Than Indifferent To Them.

To Give A Reason For Anything Is To Breed A Doubt Of It.

We Judge Of Others For The Most Part By Their Good Opinion Of Themselves; Yet Nothing Gives Such Offense Or Creates So Many Enemies, As That Extreme Self-complacency Or Superciliousness Of Manner, Which Appears To Set The Opinion Of Every One Else At Defiance.

Cant Is The Voluntary Overcharging Or Prolongation Of A Real Sentiment; Hypocrisy Is The Setting Up A Pretension To A Feeling You Never Had And Have No Wish For.

Painting For A Whole Morning Gives One As Excellent An Appetite For One's Dinner, As Old Abraham Tucker Acquired For His By Riding Over Banstead Downs.

Perhaps The Best Cure For The Fear Of Death Is To Reflect That Life Has A Beginning As Well As An End. There Was A Time When We Were Not: This Gives Us No Concern. Why, Then, Should It Trouble Us That A Time Will Come When We Shall Cease To Be?

It May Be Made A Question Whether Men Grow Wiser As They Grow Older, Anymore Than They Grow Stronger Or Healthier Or Honest.

That Humanity And Sincerity Which Dispose Men To Resist Injustice And Tyranny Render Them Unfit To Cope With The Cunning And Power Of Those Who Are Opposed To Them. The Friends Of Liberty Trust To The Professions Of Others Because They Are Themselves Sincere, And Endeavour To Secure The Public Good With The Least Possible Hurt To Its Enemies, Who Have No Regard To Anything But Their Own Unprincipled Ends, And Stick At Nothing To Accomplish Them.

As Is Our Confidence, So Is Our Capacity.

Positive Attitude

Human Life May Be Regarded As A Succession Of Frontispieces. The Way To Be Satisfied Is Never To Look Back.

Defoe Says That There Were A Hundred Thousand Country Fellows In His Time Ready To Fight To The Death Against Popery, Without Knowing Whether Popery Was A Man Or A Horse.

There Is Nothing More To Be Esteemed Than A Manly Firmness And Decision Of Character.

We Uniformly Applaud What Is Right And Condemn What Is Wrong, When It Costs Us Nothing But The Sentiment.

He Who Lives Wisely To Himself And His Own Heart Looks At The Busy World Through The Loopholes Of Retreat, And Does Not Want To Mingle In The Fray.

It Might Be Argued, That To Be A Knave Is The Gift Of Fortune, But To Play The Fool To Advantage It Is Necessary To Be A Learned Man.

The Admiration Of Power In Others Is As Common To Man As The Love Of It In Himself; The One Makes Him A Tyrant, The Other A Slave.

So I Have Loitered My Life Away, Reading Books, Looking At Pictures, Going To Plays, Hearing, Thinking, Writing On What Pleased Me Best. I Have Wanted Only One Thing To Make Me Happy, But Wanting That Have Wanted Everything.

One Said A Tooth Drawer Was A Kind Of Unconscionable Trade, Because His Trade Was Nothing Else But To Take Away Those Things Whereby Every Man Gets His Living.

He Who Does Nothing Renders Himself Incapable Of Doing Any Thing; But While We Are Executing Any Work, We Are Preparing And Qualifying Ourselves To Undertake Another.

Our Energy Is In Proportion To The Resistance It Meets.

Pride Erects A Little Kingdom Of Its Own, And Acts As Sovereign In It.

The History Of Mankind Is A Romance, A Mask, A Tragedy, Constructed Upon The Principles Of Poetical Justice; It Is A Noble Or Royal Hunt, In Which What Is Sport To The Few Is Death To The Many, And In Which The Spectators Halloo And Encourage The Strong To Set Upon The Weak, And Cry Havoc In The Chase, Though They Do Not Share In The Spoil.

They Are, As It Were, Train-bearers In The Pageant Of Life, And Hold A Glass Up To Humanity, Frailer Than Itself. We See Ourselves At Second-hand In Them: They Show Us All That We Are, All That We Wish To Be, And All That We Dread To Be. What Brings The Resemblance Nearer Is, That, As They Imitate Us, We, In Our Turn, Imitate Them. There Is No Class Of Society Whom So Many Persons Regard With Affection As Actors.

The Temple Of Fame Stands Upon The Grave: The Flame That Burns Upon Its Altars Is Kindled From The Ashes Of Great Men.

People Do Not Persist In Their Vices Because They Are Not Weary Of Them, But Because They Cannot Leave Them Off. It Is The Nature Of Vice To Leave Us No Resource But In Itself.

Dandyism Is A Species Of Genius.

There Is A Feeling Of Eternity In Youth Which Makes Us Amends For Everything. To Be Young Is To Be As One Of The Immortals.

Wit Is The Salt Of Conversation, Not The Food.

The Most Insignificant People Are The Most Apt To Sneer At Others. They Are Safe From Reprisals. And Have No Hope Of Rising In Their Own Self Esteem But By Lowering Their Neighbors.

Fashion Constantly Begins And Ends In The Two Things It Abhors Most, Singularity And Vulgarity.

A Gentleman Is One Who Understands And Shows Every Mark Of Deference To The Claims Of Self-love In Others, And Exacts It In Return From Them.

Though Familiarity May Not Breed Contempt, It Takes Off The Edge Of Admiration.

The Slaves Of Power Mind The Cause They Have To Serve, Because Their Own Interest Is Concerned; But The Friends Of Liberty Always Sacrifice Their Cause, Which Is Only The Cause Of Humanity, To Their Own Spleen, Vanity, And Self-opinion.

If You Give An Audience A Chance They Will Do Half Your Acting For You.

Death Puts An End To Rivalship And Competition. The Dead Can Boast No Advantage Over Us, Nor Can We Triumph Over Them.

The Public Have Neither Shame Or Gratitude.

Sincerity Has To Do With The Connexion Between Our Words And Thoughts, And Not Between Our Beliefs And Actions.

We Are Thankful For Good-will Rather Than For Services, For The Motive Than The Quantum Of Favor Received.

The Multitude Who Require To Be Led, Still Hate Their Leaders.

There Are Some Persons Who Never Succeed From Being Too Indolent To Undertake Anything; And Others Who Regularly Fail, Because The Instant They Find Success In Their Power, They Grow Indifferent, And Give Over The Attempt.

A Man's Reputation Is Not In His Own Keeping, But Lies At The Mercy Of The Profligacy Of Others. Calumny Requires No Proof.

The Last Sort I Shall Mention Are Verbal Critics - Mere Word-catchers, Fellows That Pick Out A Word In A Sentence And A Sentence In A Volume, And Tell You It Is Wrong. The Title Of Ultra-crepidarian Critics Has Been Given To A Variety Of This Species.

I Do Not Think That What Is Called Love At First Sight Is So Great An Absurdity As It Is Sometimes Imagined To Be. We Generally Make Up Our Minds Beforehand To The Sort Of Person We Should Like, Grave Or Gay, Black, Brown, Or Fair; With Golden Tresses Or Raven Locks; - And When We Meet With A Complete Example Of The Qualities We Admire, The Bargain Is Soon Struck.

Prejudice Is Never Easy Unless It Can Pass Itself Off For Reason.

We Are Cold To Others Only When We Are Dull In Ourselves.

We Do Not Attend To The Advice Of The Sage And Experienced Because We Think They Are Old, Forgetting That They Once Were Young And Placed In The Same Situations As Ourselves.

Vulgar Prejudices Are Those Which Arise Out Of Accident, Ignorance, Or Authority; Natural Prejudices Are Those Which Arise Out Of The Constitution Of The Human Mind Itself.

Perhaps Propriety Is As Near A Word As Any To Denote The Manners Of The Gentleman; Elegance Is Necessary To The Fine Gentleman; Dignity Is Proper To Noblemen; And Majesty To Kings.

Dr. Johnson Was A Lazy Learned Man Who Liked To Think And Talk Better Than To Read Or Write; Who, However, Wrote Much And Well, But Too Often By Rote.

We Cannot By A Little Verbal Sophistry Confound The Qualities Of Different Minds, Nor Force Opposite Excellences Into A Union By All The Intolerance In The World. If We Have A Taste For Some One Precise Style Or Manner, We May Keep It To Ourselves And Let Others Have Theirs. If We Are More Catholic In Our Notions, And Want Variety Of Excellence And Beauty, It Is Spread Abroad For Us To Profusion In The Variety Of Books And In The Several Growth Of Men's Minds, Fettered By No Capricious Or Arbitrary Rules.

If I Have Not Read A Book Before, It Is, For All Intents And Purposes, New To Me Whether It Was Printed Yesterday Or Three Hundred Years Ago.

When I Am In The Country, I Wish To Vegetate Like The Country.

The Most Learned Are Often The Most Narrow Minded.

Open Mindedness

Common Sense, To Most People, Is Nothing More Than Their Own Opinions.

Persons Without Education Certainly Do Not Want Either Acuteness Or Strength Of Mind In What Concerns Themselves, Or In Things Immediately Within Their Observation; But They Have No Power Of Abstraction, No General Standard Of Taste, Or Scale Of Opinion. They See Their Objects Always Near, And Never In The Horizon. Hence Arises That Egotism Which Has Been Remarked As The Characteristic Of Self-taught Men.

By Retaliating Our Sufferings On The Heads Of Those We Love, We Get Rid Of A Present Uneasiness And Incur Lasting Remorse. With The Accomplishment Of Our Revenge Our Fondness Returns; So That We Feel The Injury We Have Done Them, Even More Than They Do.

Principle Is A Passion For Truth.

A Hair In The Head Is Worth Two In The Brush.

Our Notions With Respect To The Importance Of Life, And Our Attachment To It, Depend On A Principle Which Has Very Little To Do With Its Happiness Or Its Misery. The Love Of Life Is, In General, The Effect Not Of Our Enjoyments, But Of Our Passions.

The Look Of A Gentleman Is Little Else Than The Reflection Of The Looks Of The World.

There Is A Heroism In Crime As Well As In Virtue. Vice And Infamy Have Their Altars And Their Religion.

The Contemplation Of Truth And Beauty Is The Proper Object For Which We Were Created, Which Calls Forth The Most Intense Desires Of The Soul, And Of Which It Never Tires.

A Man Who Does Not Endeavour To Seem More Than He Is Will Generally Be Thought Nothing Of. We Habitually Make Such Large Deductions For Pretence And Imposture That No Real Merit Will Stand Against Them. It Is Necessary To Set Off Our Good Qualities With A Certain Air Of Plausibility And Self-importance, As Some Attention To Fashion Is Necessary.

Poetry Is All That Is Worth Remembering In Life.

In Art, In Taste, In Life, In Speech, You Decide From Feeling, And Not From Reason. If We Were Obliged To Enter Into A Theoretical Deliberation On Every Occasion Before We Act, Life Would Be At A Stand, And Art Would Be Impracticable.

We Can Scarcely Hate Anyone That We Know.

To Think Ill Of Mankind And Not Wish Ill To Them, Is Perhaps The Highest Wisdom And Virtue.

Asleep, Nobody Is A Hypocrite

To Display The Greatest Powers, Unless They Are Applied To Great Purposes, Makes Nothing For The Character Of Greatness.

Fashion Is Gentility Running Away From Vulgarity And Afraid Of Being Overtaken

Those Who Wish To Forget Painful Thoughts Do Well To Absent Themselves For A While From, The Ties And Objects That Recall Them; But We Can Be Said Only To Fulfill Our Destiny In The Place That Gave Us Birth.

Books Let Us Into Their Souls And Lay Open To Us The Secrets Of Our Own.

A Distinction Has Been Made Between Acuteness And Subtlety Of Understanding. This Might Be Illustrated By Saying That Acuteness Consists In Taking Up The Points Or Solid Atoms, Subtlety In Feeling The Air Of Truth.

There Is A Quiet Repose And Steadiness About The Happiness Of Age, If The Life Has Been Well Spent. Its Feebleness Is Not Painful. The Nervous System Has Lost Its Acuteness. But, In Mature Years We Feel That A Burn, A Scald, A Cut, Is More Tolerable Than It Was In The Sensitive Period Of Youth.

A Great Chess-player Is Not A Great Man, For He Leaves The World As He Found It. No Act Terminating In Itself Constitutes Greatness. This Will Apply To All Displays Of Power Or Trials Of Skill, Which Are Confined To The Momentary, Individual Effort, And Construct No Permanent Image Or Trophy Of Themselves Without Them

Humour Is The Making Others Act Or Talk Absurdly And Unconsciously; Wit Is The Pointing Out And Ridiculing That Absurdity Consciously, And With More Or Less Ill-nature.

There Is A Softness And A Harmony In The Words And In The Thought Unparalleled. Of All Conceits It Is Surely The Most Classical. "i Count Only The Hours That Are Serene.".

It Is Easier Taking The Beaten Path Than Making Our Way Over Bogs And Precipices. The Great Difficulty In Philosophy Is To Come To Every Question With A Mind Fresh And Unshackled By Former Theories, Though Strengthened By Exercise And Information.

Nothing Is More Unjust Or Capricious Than Public Opinion.

The Garb Of Religion Is The Best Cloak For Power.

The Vain Man Makes A Merit Of Misfortune, And Triumphs In His Disgrace.

Anyone Who Has Passed Though The Regular Gradations Of A Classical Education, And Is Not Made A Fool By It, May Consider Himself As Having Had A Very Narrow Escape.

There Is An Unseemly Exposure Of The Mind, As Well As Of The Body.

What I Mean By Living To One's Self Is Living In The World, As In It, Not Of It.

The Amiable Is The Voluptuous In Expression Or Manner. The Sense Of Pleasure In Ourselves Is That Which Excites It In Others; Or, The Art Of Pleasing Is To Seem Pleased.

Old Friendships Are Like Meats Served Up Repeatedly, Cold, Comfortless, And Distasteful. The Stomach Turns Against Them.

We Grow Tired Of Everything But Turning Others Into Ridicule, And Congratulating Ourselves On Their Defects.

The Present Is An Age Of Talkers, And Not Of Doers; And The Reason Is, That The World Is Growing Old. We Are So Far Advanced In The Arts And Sciences, That We Live In Retrospect, And Dote On Past Achievement.

A Man's Reputation Is Not In His Own Keeping, But Lies At The Mercy Of The Profligacy Of Others. Calumny Requires No Proof. The Throwing Out [of] Malicious Imputations Against Any Character Leaves A Stain, Which No After-refutation Can Wipe Out. To Create An Unfavorable Impression, It Is Not Necessary That Certain Things Should Be True, But That They Have Been Said. The Imagination Is Of So Delicate A Texture That Even Words Wound It.

We Go On A Journey To Be Free Of All Impediments; To Leave Ourselves Behind Much More Than To Get Rid Of Others

That Which Anyone Has Been Long Learning Unwillingly, He Unlearns With Proportional Eagerness And Haste.

He Who Draws Upon His Own Resources Easily Comes To An End Of His Wealth.

We Prefer A Person With Vivacity And High Spirits, Though Bordering Upon Insolence, To The Timid And Pusillanimous; We Are Fonder Of Wit Joined To Malice Than Of Dullness Without It.

I'm Not Smart, But I Like To Observe. Millions Saw The Apple Fall, But Newton Was The One Who Asked Why.

The World Loves To Be Amused By Hollow Professions, To Be Deceived By Flattering Appearances, To Live In A State Of Hallucination; And Can Forgive Everything But The Plain, Downright, Simple, Honest Truth.

The Player Envies Only The Player, The Poet Envies Only The Poet.

The Surest Hindrance Of Success Is To Have Too High A Standard Of Refinement In Our Own Minds, Or Too High An Opinion Of The Judgment Of The Public. He Who Is Determined Not To Be Satisfied With Anything Short Of Perfection Will Never Do Anything To Please Himself Or Others.

To Be Forward To Praise Others Implies Either Great Eminence, That Can Afford To, Part With Applause; Or Great Quickness Of Discernment, With Confidence In Our Own Judgments; Or Great Sincerity And Love Of Truth, Getting The Better Of Our Self-love.

The More A Man Writes, The More He Can Write.

The Expression Of A Gentleman's Face Is Not So Much That Of Refinement, As Of Flexibility, Not Of Sensibility And Enthusiasm As Of Indifference; It Argues Presence Of Mind Rather Than Enlargement Of Ideas.

Presence Of Mind

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